1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a composite storage apparatus where a plurality of different types of storage devices are mounted, and a card board thereof, and more particularly to a composite storage apparatus where a disk drive and a memory card are mounted, and a card board thereof.
2. Description of the Related Art
A disk drive using such storage medium as a magnetic disk, magneto-optical disk and optical disk can store large capacity, but are relatively large in size. A memory card using a semiconductor memory, on the other hand, is relatively small in size, but has a small storage capacity, so it is suitable for compact equipment.
Along with the recent advancements in digital processing technology, such portable equipment as digital cameras and digital video cameras are spreading, and for such portable equipment, memory cards, including a compact flash (CF) card, memory stick (MS) card (trade mark), smart media (SM) card, secure digital (SD) card, and multi-media card (MMC) are used.
A preferable type of usage is to edit the stored content of such a memory card by a personal computer, storing the result in a large capacity disk drive, and to use the memory card again. For this, a composite storage apparatus where a memory card reader/writer and a disk drive (MO drive) are integrated into one device unit has been proposed (e.g. Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2000-358207).
As a specific configuration of the composite storage apparatus, a memory card connector and a memory card controller are mounted on the board of the disk drive, and the interface with the host is limited to one type (e.g. Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-288964, and Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2001-022899).
In other words, in prior art, the interface of the memory card and the disk drive is one type (e.g. ATA (AT Attached)/ATAPI (AT Attached Packet Interface) or USB (Universal Serial Bus)), so one type of host interface is supported.
However in general purpose personal computers, various interfaces (such a serial interface as USB, and parallel interface as ATA/ATAPI) exist, and in memory cards as well, various interfaces (such a parallel interface as a CF card and serial interface as MS/SM/SD/MMC) exist.
In prior art, it is difficult for one composite storage apparatus with a memory card and disk drive to support such various interfaces. Constructing a composite storage apparatus using a disk drive and a memory card in which a plurality of interfaces are mounted respectively increases cost, because it is necessary to redesign and reproduce a disk drive and memory card which have a single interface for this purpose.
Also the size of the composite storage apparatus must be larger, which makes it difficult to contain in a 1 inch height (3.5 type storage form factor), and therefore makes it difficult to build this composite storage apparatus into a personal computer, digital camera and DVD recorder.